On the Detection of Exomoons Transiting Isolated Planetary-mass Objects

Limbach, Mary Anne; Vos, Johanna M.; Winn, Joshua N.; Heller, René; Mason, Jeffrey C.; Schneider, Adam C.; Dai, Fei

doi:10.3847/2041-8213/ac1e2d

Cited by 27 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 150 publications

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“…2MASS J0835+1953 b joins 2MASS J1119-1137 AB b (Limbach et al 2021) as the only reported planet candidates around brown dwarfs, to date. We intend to continue our follow-up campaign of 2MASS J0835+1953, but the effectiveness of this effort will be limited by the typical constraints of ground-based observing, namely weather losses and gaps during the day.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

The Perkins INfrared Exosatellite Survey (PINES). II. Transit Candidates and Implications for Planet Occurrence around L and T Dwarfs

Tamburo¹,

Muirhead²,

McCarthy³

et al. 2022

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We describe a new transit-detection algorithm designed to detect single-transit events in discontinuous Perkins INfrared Exosatellite Survey (PINES) observations of L and T dwarfs. We use this algorithm to search for transits in 131 PINES light curves and identify two transit candidates: 2MASS J18212815+1414010 (2MASS J1821+1414) and 2MASS J08350622+1953050 (2MASS J0835+1953). We disfavor 2MASS J1821+1414 as a genuine transit candidate due to the known variability properties of the source. We cannot rule out the planetary nature of 2MASS J0835+1953's candidate event and perform follow-up observations in an attempt to recover a second transit. A repeat event has yet to be observed, but these observations suggest that target variability is an unlikely cause of the candidate transit. We perform a Markov Chain Monte Carlo simulation of the light curve and estimate a planet radius ranging from 4.2 − 1.6 + 3.5 R ⊕ to 5.8 − 2.1 + 4.8 R ⊕ , depending on the host’s age. Finally, we perform an injection and recovery simulation on our light-curve sample. We inject planets into our data using measured M-dwarf planet occurrence rates and attempt to recover them using our transit-search algorithm. Our detection rates suggest that, assuming M-dwarf planet occurrence rates, we should have roughly a 1% chance of detecting a candidate that could cause the transit depth we observe for 2MASS J0835+1953. If 2MASS J0835+1953 b is confirmed, it would suggest an enhancement in the occurrence of short-period planets around L and T dwarfs in comparison to M dwarfs, which would challenge predictions from planet formation models.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 81%

The Perkins INfrared Exosatellite Survey (PINES). II. Transit Candidates and Implications for Planet Occurrence around L and T Dwarfs

Tamburo¹,

Muirhead²,

McCarthy³

et al. 2022

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“…During those two rotations we see significant evolution in the light curve, including the emergence of a ∼ 1% dip with a 1 hr duration in the light curve at 15 hr. This dip may be due to the emergence of a Great Red Spot analog (Apai et al 2017), or even a transiting satellite (Tamburo & Muir-head 2019;Limbach et al 2021). Long-term follow-up observations could differentiate the cause of such dips in the light curve of 2MASS J0642+4101.…”

Section: Youth and Variability Properties Of Inidividual Objectsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Let the Great World Spin: Revealing the Stormy, Turbulent Nature of Young Giant Exoplanet Analogs with the Spitzer Space Telescope

Vos,

Faherty,

Gagné

et al. 2022

Preprint

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We present a survey for photometric variability in young, low-mass brown dwarfs with the Spitzer Space Telescope. The 23 objects in our sample show robust signatures of youth and share properties with directly-imaged exoplanets. We present three new young objects: 2MASS J03492367+0635078, 2MASS J09512690 −8023553 and 2MASS J07180871−6415310. We detect variability in 13 young objects, and find that young brown dwarfs are highly likely to display variability across the L2-T4 spectral type range. In contrast, the field dwarf variability occurrence rate drops for spectral types >L9. We examine the variability amplitudes of young objects and find an enhancement in maximum amplitudes compared to field dwarfs. We speculate that the observed range of amplitudes within a spectral type may be influenced by secondary effects such as viewing inclination and/or rotation period. We combine our new rotation periods with the literature to investigate the effects of mass on angular momentum evolution. While high mass brown dwarfs (> 30M Jup ) spin up over time, the same trend is not apparent for lower mass objects (< 30M Jup ), likely due to the small number of measured periods for old, low-mass objects. The rotation periods of companion brown dwarfs and planetary-mass objects are consistent with those of isolated objects with similar ages and masses, suggesting similar angular momentum histories. Within the AB Doradus group, we find a high variability occurrence rate and evidence for common angular momentum evolution. The results are encouraging for future variability searches in directly-imaged exoplanets with facilities such as the James Webb Space Telescope and 30-meter telescopes.

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“…Photometric observations of isolated planetary mass objects (Limbach et al 2021) would represent a useful pathway to understand their intrinsic variability and to demonstrate the presence of satellites around these objects. The comparison of the frequency of exomoons around isolated planetary-mass objects with those around planetary companions orbiting stars would also be highly interesting for our understanding of their formation mechanisms.…”

Section: Transitsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Detectability of satellites around directly imaged exoplanets and brown dwarfs

Lazzoni,

Desidera,

Gratton

et al. 2022

Preprint

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Satellites around substellar companions are a heterogeneous class of objects with a variety of different formation histories. Focusing on potentially detectable satellites around exoplanets and brown dwarfs, we might expect to find objects belonging to two main populations: planet-like satellites similar to Titan or the Galileian Satellites -likely formed within the scope of core accretion; and binary-like objects, formed within different scenarios, such as disk instability. The properties of these potential satellites would be very different from each other. Additionally, we expect that their characterization would provide insightful information about the history of the system. This is particularly important for planets/brown dwarfs discovered via direct imaging (DI) with ambiguous origins. In this paper, we review different techniques, applied to DI planets/brown dwarfs, that can be used to discover such satellites. This was achieved by simulating a population of satellites around the exoplanet 𝛽 Pic b, which served as a test case. For each simulated satellite, the amplitude of DI, radial velocity, transit and astrometric signals, with respect to the planet, were retrieved and compared with the detection limits of current and future instruments. Furthermore, we compiled a list of 38 substellar companions discovered via DI to give a preliminary estimate on the probability of finding satellites extracted from the two populations mentioned above, with different techniques. This simplified approach shows that detection of planet-like satellites, though not strictly impossible, is very improbable. On the other hand, detection of binary-like satellites is within the capabilities of current instrumentation.

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On the Detection of Exomoons Transiting Isolated Planetary-mass Objects

Cited by 27 publications

References 150 publications

The Perkins INfrared Exosatellite Survey (PINES). II. Transit Candidates and Implications for Planet Occurrence around L and T Dwarfs

The Perkins INfrared Exosatellite Survey (PINES). II. Transit Candidates and Implications for Planet Occurrence around L and T Dwarfs

Let the Great World Spin: Revealing the Stormy, Turbulent Nature of Young Giant Exoplanet Analogs with the Spitzer Space Telescope

Detectability of satellites around directly imaged exoplanets and brown dwarfs

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